TO A COUNTRY HOST.
(A Candid Answer to a Hospitable Invitation.)
You're kind enough to bid me spend
The "week-end" at your country seat,
You offer tennis and a friend
You feel I'm sure to like to meet.
I hope you will not think me rude—
You're very kind to ask me down—
But if the simple truth be told,
I much prefer to stay in town.
You tell me that the ground is bare,
And only gets by slow degrees
Recovered from our Arctic spell,
That leafless still are all the trees.
Well, here, in spite of smoke and soot,
And all the bustle and the hum
Of men and things, we don't await
The Spring—because the Spring has come.
Each morning as I go to work
I take my 'bus to Marble Arch,
And thence amid a wealth of flowers,
And air perfumed with odours, march
To Hyde Park Corner. Tell me where—
I honestly should like to know—
The much belauded "country" can
Produce a comparable show?
Our grass is green, though yours is brown.
On every tree the lovely bud
Is bursting into lovelier leaf,
The Spring runs madly in one's blood.
To leave such joys I can't consent,
Too great a struggle it would be,
But just to show you don't resent
These lines—come up and stay with me!